Hunter’s First Rule of Holes: Keep Digging
After being called on the carpet for her misleading description of a trial lawyer as a “staunch Republican” — despite the fact that he had donated to Democrats over Republicans by a margin of nearly 8 to 1 — Jennifer Hunter first doubled down . . . and now doubles down again.
Namely, she says today that it was a “truthful statement” that trial lawyer Jim Ronca is a “staunch Republican” who “was so fed up by the Bush White House that he was going to support and give money to Democrats.” Those who disagreed, based on his overwhelming pattern of contributions to Democrats, do not care about the truth; rather, Hunter says, they are simply “demagogic Republicans.”
I think that’s “quadrupling down.”
I believe I finally understand her point. In Ms. Hunter’s dictionary, “staunch” is defined as “occasional.”
Under this definition, Ms. Hunter is a staunch truth-teller.
It’s so entertaining to find yet another Big Media journalist who never digs so deep as when she’s digging herself a hole.
Thanks to several readers.
Ms. Hunter doesn’t care. She doesn’t have to. She’s married to the publisher.
robert ferrigno (16589e) — 7/24/2007 @ 12:16 pm“I am going to have some investigation done into the source and funding for this blog…”
James R. Ronca, Esq.
A legal bully AND a staunch Republican!
TakeFive (2bf7bd) — 7/24/2007 @ 12:28 pmBy these standards, she’d report that Joe Lieberman, Zell Miller, and Dick Morris are staunch Republicans.
Al (b624ac) — 7/24/2007 @ 12:32 pmFor some people, “oops” is a four-letter word!
ras (adf382) — 7/24/2007 @ 12:50 pmyou have to remember this internet tube thingy is relatively new. Up to just a few short years ago, there was really no way to fact check the media unless the media (or a competing outlet) allowed you to do so. With peoples short attention span and memory, a reporter like this one could just keep repeating the same thing over and over again, and it would eventually be considered factual. She just hasn’t accepted the change yet. It’s the same as Dan Rather wanting to “break” the story about the memo’s should they be proved to be fake, a week or so after everyone in the English speaking world agreed that they were in fact fake. She just hasn’t realized that she is no longer the gatekeeper.
buzz (9e5c44) — 7/24/2007 @ 1:02 pmbuzz,
Very true. She is still in denial about her loss of journalistic immunity. Four more stages to go!
ras (adf382) — 7/24/2007 @ 1:30 pmShe has yet to scream “censorship” – a common response of liberals who are criticized.
Perfect Sense (b6ec8c) — 7/24/2007 @ 2:33 pmFrom a journalistic standpoint, the issue seems to be whether the facts that she left out, i.e., that the guy was donating to Dems would have eviscerated the story. It would have. Game over.
Law (62ca0c) — 7/24/2007 @ 2:43 pmAnd note that Mr. Ronca himself never uses the term “staunch Republican,” preferring instead to describe himself as a “lifelong Republican” and later as a “long-term Republican.” This is a significant difference: as an analogy, one can be baptized Catholic, attend Catholic schools, and occasionally attend a Catholic mass, but that would not exactly make one a “staunch Catholic,” especially if it is discovered that same individual regularly attends a Presbyterian Church too.
It is difficult deciding which one of the two characters is more full of garbage: the hack journalist or the phony-baloney trial lawyer.
JVW (6a3590) — 7/24/2007 @ 3:34 pmAm I the only one that sees a remarkable parallel between Ms. Hunter’s ‘yeah, but” mindset and the “fake but accurate” appraisal by the NYT of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes’ pathetic National Guard story?
John Casteel (ffb92e) — 7/24/2007 @ 3:36 pmNo.
Paul (0544fc) — 7/24/2007 @ 4:09 pmThis campaign against you and me is ridiculous and I think evidence of how the Republican Party works. They make an effort to pressure journalists to print what they want and avoid what the Republican Party does not like. No free thinking or free press is allowed. They smear everyone who opposes them from big fish like Joe Wilson to small fries like me.
I mean, if that doesn’t scream staunch Republican to you, then what does?
paul zummo (7fcccc) — 7/24/2007 @ 4:22 pmThat’s got to be the worst pick-up line I’ve ever heard.
Glen Wishard (b1987d) — 7/24/2007 @ 4:49 pmWhen will they learn? There is no funding. No funding is needed. People have a platform, and there’s nothing you can do about it. The information monopoly is over. Deal with it.
Pablo (99243e) — 7/24/2007 @ 5:27 pmAll you have to do is read this “staunch life-long Republican’s” letter to see that he is objectively not.
JD (26b504) — 7/24/2007 @ 6:05 pmI’v been a registered member of one national party since I was 21 (some 40 plus years now) and last voted for the Presidential candidate of that party in 1968. I think and vote in a particular way but have just never got round to changing my voter registration. As Joe Lieberman might say, my party left me. I guess in Ms. Hunter’s world that means I’m a “staunch” member of my party.
Can you spell Nelly Numb Skull when you think about Ms. Hunter?
Mike Myers (2e43f5) — 7/24/2007 @ 6:14 pmListen guys, you know I’m with you, but am I missing something? Sure, he’s a RINO, but if everything in that letter is true, I think both he and Hunter have a pretty good argument.
CraigC (c4ea17) — 7/24/2007 @ 9:08 pmA RINO is a staunch Republican?
How do you define “staunch,” CraigC?
Patterico (2a65a5) — 7/24/2007 @ 11:49 pm“How do you define “staunch,” CraigC?”
Doesn’t one “staunch the bleeding?” Maybe she defines the word in some fashion derived from putting an end to something. If that’s the case, maybe what she’s actually saying is “he was a Republican but he’s stopped being one!”
Yeah, that’s it, I’m sure. No, wait, that doesn’t fit her “narrative.”
Dan S (d281eb) — 7/25/2007 @ 5:15 amWell, yes, I guess the definition of “staunch” is open to interpretation. I repeat that if the facts as he laid them out are true, they would seem to have a pretty good argument from their point of view.
CraigC (c4ea17) — 7/25/2007 @ 7:09 amThe issue as I see it is whether she deliberately picked this guy in a dishonest effort to portray Republicans as deserting Bush. It seems far more likely to me that, like most liberals, she’s oblivious to anything that doesn’t comport with her own worldview. That only makes it incrementally less pernicious, but I can see that as far as they’re concerned, the objections to the story are unfounded.
CraigC (c4ea17) — 7/25/2007 @ 7:46 am“I am going to have some investigation done into the source and funding for this blog and I will give it to you. Maybe we can get you some information so you can write a Pulitzer Prize-winning article on the Republican conservative party sneak attacks on free press and free speech.”
Finally, the vast Rovian right wing conspiracy to attack Republicans has been outed!
Matt (4d32f9) — 7/25/2007 @ 12:08 pmCraigC,
A “staunch” Republican is not going to write, “I am going to have some investigation done into the source and funding for this blog and I will give it to you. Maybe we can get you some information so you can write a Pulitzer Prize-winning article on the Republican conservative party sneak attacks on free press and free speech.”
They have no defense.
Bill M (ee2ae1) — 7/25/2007 @ 5:51 pmYou apparently didn’t understand what I was saying. We may not think the guy is a “staunch” Republican, but based on all of his activities with the party and their innate obliviousness to anything that contradicts their closely-held beliefs, I can see how they could.
CraigC (c4ea17) — 7/25/2007 @ 7:14 pm